Industrial education has reached the stage of evolution where a major transition is required if it is to continue as a viable field of education and contribute to the solution of some of society's significant and critical problems. If industrial arts practitioners are to guide their field through an orderly transformation, they must follow a different research agenda than the time-honored, traditional one. An examination of existing research dealing with industrial education reveals that it focuses primarily on how to teach rather than on what to teach. The research agenda for industrial education should be derived from problems grounded in two disciplines, technology and pedagogy. Included among the research problems that would be natural in this new agenda are questions related to work and its meaning, public policy concerning the adoption and use of new technologies, and the use and means of technical systems. (MN)